


Alright, come close

by energie_vie



Series: Gooey [1]
Category: The Old Guard (Comics), The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Mutual Pining, POV Nile Freeman, Post-Movie: The Old Guard (2020), Recreational Drug Use, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:27:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26836687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/energie_vie/pseuds/energie_vie
Summary: "It's not like he doesn't know that she finds him attractive, she's told him a thousand times before, but never so bluntly. She feels like she's floating and sinking at the same time and the atmosphere is so charged and she's tired of them dancing around each other so fuck it, full speed ahead."OR: Booker and Nile get stoned and sometimes an external push is all that's missing.
Relationships: Booker | Sebastien le Livre/Nile Freeman
Series: Gooey [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1983568
Comments: 20
Kudos: 165





	Alright, come close

**Author's Note:**

> So I posted my first fic a few days ago and was genuinely overwhelmed by the positive feedback, so this is my second attempt. Hope it's as enjoyed as the first one.
> 
> Rated M only because of the recreational drug use.
> 
> LE: somewhere between this fic and the next one in the series I also started working on a prequel; so, if you'd like to know how they end up in this point, you can jump to the [Magnetic](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1987831) series.
> 
> EDIT: now with cover art by the wonderful StarWatcher.

\---

'We should smoke some weed,' Nile blurts out all of a sudden.

They're in a hotel in Tokyo and she's bored out of her mind. Andy had sent them ahead for a basic recon mission and it went as smoothly as it could have gone, which was a bit surprising, since experience had taught Nile that something usually went wrong when gathering intel while trying to be inconspicuous.

Not this time, though, so she and Booker had an entire day and night to kill before meeting the rest of the team tomorrow. And if the day had been spent wandering the city and generally goofing around, in the early evening the weather had suddenly shifted from downcast to Noah's flood, which means they're now cooped up in a hotel room while outside it's raining cats and dogs.

She is reclining on the headboard, listlessly flipping through channels on the TV while Booker is splayed sideways with his head on her thighs, mindlessly scrolling through YouTube.

The minute the words leave her mouth, his head snaps towards her so quickly that she can actually hear his neck crack a little.

'Come again?' he asks incredulously.

'You heard me. I'm bored as hell, there's nothing on TV and you're ignoring me.'

'No, I'm not. I asked you if you wanted to browse YouTube with me.'

'What are you even watching?' She reaches to turn the laptop around and promptly rolls her eyes. 'Conspiracy theories again?'

Booker just shrugs. 'They're entertaining.'

'Whatever you say. So, wanna go get some?'

Booker sighs, closes the laptop and turns his full attention to her which, even after all these years of working together and then becoming best friends, still leaves her breathless, even if only for a second. It's his eyes, she thinks, the way they zero in on hers, as if the background has just faded away. Sometimes she swears it really does. 'It's raining!'

Nile snorts. 'Really? Of all the things you could say to dissuade me, this is the one you pick?'

'It's late?' he tries again, half-heartedly.

Nile doesn't even bother to reply to this one, just quirks a single eyebrow.

'I'm serious, we need to get up early tomorrow. We need to be at the airport at 7.'

Nile rolls her eyes, mutters something under her breath that sounds like "wet blanket" and then seems to resign herself.

'You could just say no, you know. It's not that hard.'

'I never say no to you,' Booker says matter-of-factly and it hits her like a freight train, the realisation that in all these years they've known each other, he has never actually refused her anything. Pancakes at 2 in the morning when she can't sleep? Sure thing. An entire day spent at the Vatican, gawking at the Sistine Chapel for the millionth time? He'd seen it all before, but why not? Camping for a week in the mountains of Bulgaria? Not without a few protests, but in the end, he had let himself be convinced that seven days with no running water would be the perfect holiday.

'Which is why you're my favourite person in the whole wide world!' _And I love you so much I can barely look at you without wanting to do something irrational_ , she adds in her head.

'You said the same thing to Nicky last week,' he scoffs.

'No, I said he's my favourite _cook_ in the whole wide world. You, on the other hand...'

Booker is still looking at her so intensely that she's seconds away from leaning down and pressing her lips against his. But as fierce as she might be in most other aspects of her life, she's a bit of a coward when it comes to him, so she just cards her fingers through his hair and doesn't finish her sentence.

'So when do you want to go?'

'Um.. now?' she answers giddily and basically pushes him off her in her haste to get off the bed before he has a chance to change his mind. Booker yelps indignantly, but then he chuckles, so Nile just makes an impatient gesture and that's the end of the conversation.

Two hours and a trip to the city outskirts later they're back in the hotel room and Nile is lighting the second blunt. During the first one they had watched a few conspiracy videos, adding their own commentary and laughing like idiots.

'Told you they're entertaining,' Booker had nudged her shoulder at a certain point.

'Yeah, if you're stoned,' she had immediately quipped and Booker had laughed heartily and dropped a kiss to her temple.

'You know, you're my favourite person in the whole wide world too,' he had said out of the blue and so seriously that Nile's heart had started beating just a little bit faster. But then he had suggested moving to Netflix and she had cursed herself for the inability to say something that would push things along.

'I don't feel like watching anything anymore. It's not like I can focus too much,' she slurs while inhaling.

'Huh?' comes the intelligent reply and Nile giggles uncontrollably.

'No more watching stuff. We can barely focus on each other.'

Booker blinks twice and then grins, pushing the laptop aside. He reaches for it again, then pushes it back aside and then finally decides on keeping it close by. Five seconds later, he opens YouTube to look for some music.

'Seb, stop fidgeting, you're giving me whiplash!'

'Sorry, it's the weed.' He takes a long drag, closes his eyes and holds it in. Five seconds later, he exhales with a long sigh, though his lips are twitching in a hidden smile. They're both sitting on the floor, Booker leaning against the bed and Nile sprawled on the fluffy carpet.

'I feel like mozzarella on a pizza,' she says, dragging all the vowels.

'What?' he laughs heartily and Nile sighs impatiently because he doesn't get it. 'Like I'm melting.'

'Oh. Makes perfect sense,' he chuckles. 'Why are we doing this again?'

'Because we can. Because we want to. Because there's no reason not to.' She pauses. 'I feel like I'm soiling your virtue,' she remarks dryly and she's not even sure where that comes from. _Guess I'm starting to lose my inhibition_ , she thinks and isn't _this_ what she was planning all along?

A snort and then full-on laughter. His blue eyes, usually crystal clear, are now murky and just a tad bloodshot. This is him at his sexiest, Nile ponders, tousled hair, two-day stubble, bloodshot eyes and one of his damned hoodies that fit him just so. Black today.

'Virtue, huh? You do realise it's not the eighteenth century!'

'What would you know? You weren't even alive for most of it.' And she sticks her tongue out for good measure.

'I was more alive than you were,' he smirks satisfiedly.

'I think your English is deserting you.'

He stares at her and it's Nile's turn to smirk.

'I hate you!'

'No, you don't. You wouldn't get anything out of it.'

Another smirk from her, an exasperated eye-roll from him.

'You have such a distorted view of me,' Booker says dramatically, but his eyes are sparkling with barely concealed humour. 

'No, I don't. Oh, I love this song!' Nile claps enthusiastically and it's his turn to smirk again.

'I know. It makes you think dirty things.'

_Whoa, this came out of nowhere _, Nile thinks and her mouth is suddenly dry and not because of the weed.__

____

'Yeah? What else do you know?'

____

His eyes are smouldering and he's licking his lips very slowly.

____

'That you're hogging it,' he says and it feels like a damn smirking competition but two can play this game. 

____

'You know, you should stop wearing this black hoodie,' she says in a neutral tone and when he lifts his eyebrows in a silent question, she adds casually: 'You're dangerously hot in it!'

____

Booker freezes for a few seconds. It's not like he doesn't know that she finds him attractive, she's told him a thousand times before, but never so bluntly. She feels like she's floating and sinking at the same time and the atmosphere is so charged and she's tired of them dancing around each other so fuck it, full speed ahead.

____

Booker takes another long drag and releases it slowly, as if considering what to say. 'It's for your benefit only.'

____

'Oh, really?'

____

'Yeah. You look at me in a certain way when I wear it,' he adds as an afterthought and Nile's pulse trebles as she gathers herself from the floor and moves to a sitting position in front of him. 

____

'How?' she says quietly.

____

'Like I look at you when you have your hair down.'

____

_Like you're hungry, like you wanna grab me and hold me close and..._ 'Like now?' she whispers.

____

Three seconds of silence. And then he bites his lip and nods. 'Was I hogging it?' 

____

It's Nile's turn to nod. Booker holds the blunt close to her lips so that she can take a long drag of her own and all she wants is to kiss him senseless and then drag him to bed. _If you don't do something in the next minute, I'm going to explode!_

____

Booker reaches for the laptop to change the song. 'This one always makes me think of you.'

____

'How so?'

____

He doesn't reply. He just lunges forward and kisses her like it's all he's ever wanted to do and Nile thinks that may very well be true. 

____

When he pulls back, his eyes are still closed and there's a certain air of uncertainty in them when he opens them a few moments later that it literally makes her heart ache. 

____

So she grins at him and says: 'Finally!' And his matching grin is so radiant that she feels like doing somersaults. 

____

'Yeah, finally,' he says and resumes kissing her. 

____

The next morning they don't make it to the airport in time and when they finally arrive an hour later, they unceremoniously ignore the snarky comments because they're too busy making googly eyes at each other and grinning stupidly.

____

**Author's Note:**

> The song Nile says she loves is This World by Selah Sue (it makes me think dirty things as well when I listen to it), while the one Booker mentions is Gooey by Glass Animals (the title is inspired from the first line of the song). Thanks a lot for reading!


End file.
